by BETH KERY
“I was right about him being a swimmer, wasn’t I, Guy?” she murmured to the small fox once she’d placed the dish and bowl several feet away from where he still hovered anxiously at the edge of the woods. When she backed away, granting him ample room, he limped toward the food. Poor thing, Sophie thought when he left the cover of the woods and she saw how thin he really was. He finished the hamburger and milk in seconds, and then glanced up at her a little reproachfully, as if to say, Is that all? She laughed.
“That’s it for now. You come back in a few hours for more. You’ll get sick if you eat too much so quickly, starved as you were.”
She started coffee and showered quickly when she returned to the house, then put on her standard lake clothing—a bikini and shorts. Thomas had just risen out of the water when she walked out onto the dock carrying a towel and a tray ten minutes later.
“Thanks,” he murmured when she handed him the towel. He idly dried off his wet hair and face as he watched her set down the tray and sit cross-legged on the dock. Her skin prickled with awareness when his gaze trailed down over her bikini-clad torso. She was having difficulty not eating up the sight of him, as well, as he sat there with his long, well-formed legs hanging over the dock, his taut abdomen moving in and out slightly from the exertion of his exercise.
“Coffee?” she asked breathlessly, pulling her gaze off the vision of his succulent shoulder and upper arm muscles beaded with water. He nodded and she poured him a cup from the small carafe.
“Time for you to feed me now, huh?” he teased warmly as he accepted the coffee.
She arched an eyebrow. “I would imagine you’ve worked up a good appetite.”
His smile widened rakishly before he helped himself to a slice of buttered toast. “Tastes good,” he said appreciatively a moment later before he grabbed another slice.
“You sound surprised.”
“I haven’t had much of an appetite lately.”
“And haven’t been sleeping well, either, I’m willing to bet,” Sophie added evenly before she took a sip of coffee. She immediately regretted her words when a shadow fell across his features. She’d been facing his profile, so when he turned and glanced out at the calm lake, munching his toast more slowly now, she couldn’t observe his expression.
“Thomas—”
“I don’t want to talk about my brother right now,” he said quietly, but she heard the warning in his tone. He turned and gave her a brooding glance.
Maybe he’d read her mind. She had been planning to subtly encourage him to put his grief into words. The trauma of Rick’s and Abel’s deaths was festering inside of him, making him suffer. And Sophie suspected that was only part of what he grieved. If only he’d release some of the poison, the chances were his memories from that dark period of time would slowly start to come back to him. Trauma amnesias—both physical and psychological—were much more common than people realized, and they usually resolved given a supportive environment where the mind had a chance to heal.
But Sophie also knew he had to process his grief at his own pace. If she pushed him too hard, she’d pay for the error. He’d flee . . . or do something rash, given his volatile state.
“All right,” she said evenly.
He looked a little sheepish and relieved at once at her agreement. He leaned back on one arm and lifted his coffee, his large hand encircling the entire cup versus utilizing the handle.
“So . . . what do you like to do while you’re here, Dr. Gable?” he asked gruffly.
Sophie swallowed some toast. “Oh . . . a lot of this,” she glanced between them and out toward the lake.
“So you haven’t been working frenziedly on your research articles?”
“No, I told you I’d procrastinate. Once I get used to swimming any time of the day I want, taking long walks, reading until the wee hours of the morning, and creating awful paintings, I’ll get around to the articles.”
He smiled. “How long have you painted?”
“I just started a couple years ago. I was getting really stressed with my job, and I have a friend—a psychologist—who insisted I start doing something to unwind. I signed up for a couple classes at a community college—tai chi, sailing, painting, ceramics. Only the painting took. It relaxes me.”
“The psychologist who’s your friend—is he the one who works in your office?”
She examined him closely as she nodded her head, but she couldn’t decipher his expression.
“Andy Lancaster. We met during undergrad at the University of Chicago. We’d both volunteered to take part in a psych experiment for extra credit. It was about conformity and obedience, and we were supposed to shock a puppy when it did anything but sit still. Both Andy and I refused point blank, but Andy was so stressed out by the whole thing, he practically had a break down, even when they told him the puppy really wasn’t being harmed, that the subjects just needed to think it was for the purpose of the experiment. Andy doesn’t have a mean bone in his body, though, and it really shook him up. I took him for a beer afterwards to unwind and we’ve been friends ever since.”
Thomas’s smile dawned slowly, snagging her gaze. She realized she was grinning back at him. “Picking up strays even as a girl,” he murmured. “It’s easy to see why you became a doctor. You practice internal medicine, right?”
Sophie nodded.
“I’ve watched you with your patients a couple times while I was in the waiting room. They trust you. I can tell. They really believe you care.”
He said it with such genuine warmth that Sophie blushed in mixed embarrassment and pleasure. “Thanks. What about you?” she asked, longing to turn the topic away from herself. “Does it make sense that you became an investment advisor?”
“No sense whatsoever,” he replied before he tossed the last of his toast in his mouth and washed it down with some coffee.
“Why’d you do it then?”
He shook his head while he chewed, a grin still shaping his mouth. “I had to do something once I left Mama’s arms.”
“Mama?”
“The military,” he chuckled, seeing her stunned expression.
“Hardly a maternal figure.”
He tilted his head as though considering the matter thoughtfully. “The Navy took care of me for sixteen years of my life. Orphans can’t be too picky about who takes them in.”
Her smile faded.
“Still . . . why did you choose the financial sector when you became a civilian?” she asked.
He shrugged. “I’m good with numbers. I remember my mom—my real mom—used to say my dad was, too, even though he only finished the seventh grade. When I was in the second grade, I asked my real dad who the founding fathers were, and he said, “I’m not sure about the other guys, but Lincoln headed ’em up.” He met her gaze and smiled. “But numbers—that was different. He could just glance at a page-long column of three- or four-digit numbers and tell you if the bottom line was incorrect. I’m not quite as impressive as my dad, but I got the freak gene.”
“He was a savant,” Sophie murmured.
Thomas nodded.
“Thomas?” He met her stare. “Is that why you’re so convinced that the FBI was wrong about their allegations about your client? Mannero?”
“I don’t make mistakes when it comes to the books, Sophie. If the IRS gave the FBI a tip that Mannero was using crooked accounting, they were looking at different books than I saw.”
Sophie nodded thoughtfully.
“Now I have a question for you,” he said as he picked up another piece of toast.
She raised her eyebrows and took a sip of coffee.
“Your psychologist friend? Lancaster? Is that all he is to you? A friend?”
The abrupt change in his tone and topic made her blink. “Yes. He’s happily married. I’m friends with his wife, Sheila, as well.”
Thomas nodded. His earlier broad smile and light manner might have been a figment of her imagination. “And is he a good doctor? In your opin
ion?”
Sophie opened her mouth to say she knew why he was asking; she knew his brother had been Andy’s patient. But she recalled what he’d said about not wanting to talk about Rick at the moment and swallowed her words.
“He’s an excellent psychologist,” she sufficed to say.
He nodded again, his gaze intent on her face.
“I wonder ...” He began thoughtfully.
“What?”
“Maybe you were born with this proclivity for taking in strays, like I was born with the freak math gene.”
She froze in the action of lifting a crescent of orange to her mouth and met his stare. She’d heard the mocking tone, the slight self-disparagement.
“Everybody gets a little lost sometimes, Thomas.”
She couldn’t quite read the message in his shadowed eyes, but he no longer looked amused.
“You should take care, Sophie. You’re more like your friend Dr. Lancaster than you may think. A kind heart can be taken advantage of,” he said quietly.
She took a bite out of the orange and chewed. “Have you ever noticed that you have a habit of warning me to stay away from you?”
He grunted softly and glanced out at the lake.
“So how’s your newest patient doing?” he asked after a moment.
She exhaled slowly, recognizing she’d been rebuffed with the change of topic. “Guy is fine. He won’t let me anywhere near that injured paw, of course, but hopefully if I can keep him fed, it’ll heal on its own.”
They spent the large portion of the remainder of the morning on the dock, leisurely eating the breakfast Sophie had supplied, swimming when they got too warm, and talking about what Sophie would term more “safe” topics—the sports they enjoyed, favorite restaurants in the city, their careers.
They lolled in the sun, and Sophie was glad to see that Thomas drifted off for a few minutes. She’d guessed he hadn’t slept much last night. When he awoke, he mumbled something about dreaming he was a fish cooking in a frying pan. Sophie suggested a swim.
Later, she told him a story while they both treaded water about how she’d dared to ask a boy up to the lake house when she was eleven years old.
“I think he and his parents thought it was a bit strange, actually, for a girl my age to ask a boy to spend a weekend with her,” Sophie explained with a grin. “But all my girlfriends were busy, and I hated to come to the lake house without a companion. So I convinced Eric Summers to come here, right?”
Thomas nodded, listening.
“And I was mortified when we were swimming together and a fish bit me in the butt. Hard, too,” she added through Thomas’s unabashed male laughter. “I mean enough to break the skin, make me scream like a banshee, and rush up onto the dock bringing half the lake water with me, grabbing my butt like I thought my hand was the only thing holding it onto my body. Eric Summers never did come back with me to Lake Haven after that. Apparently I’d confirmed all his suspicions about going away for the weekend with an eleven-year-old girl. I hope I didn’t scar him for life in regard to romantic getaways.”
Thomas was still laughing when he swam closer. Their water-lubricated skin slid sensually next to one another’s and their treading legs tangled. He planted a quick, wet kiss on her mouth—grin to grin—and remained close, so that their lips caressed when he murmured, “If I had been that little boy, I’d have told you the fish around here have very good taste.”
Sophie’s eyes went wide when he slid his large hand beneath the panties of her bikini and gave a buttock a firm squeeze. His expression was distilled mischief, but Sophie recognized the appreciative male gleam in his eyes as well.
“I don’t know how I kept myself away from you for two years,” he said.
Sophie almost forgot to tread water she was so surprised by his sudden admission.
“I . . . I wish you hadn’t,” Sophie replied. “I’m still not sure why you made a point of it.”
“Instinct, maybe.” His slow grin took her by surprise yet again. He kissed her, quick and potent. “Self-preservation?”
“Do you honestly think I would cause you some sort of harm?” Sophie asked bemusedly, highly distracted by his nearness, not to mention his sensual stroking of her bare ass.
His knowing, amused look confused her.
“What?” Sophie asked.
He shook his head slowly. Sophie got the impression he considered her an innocent for not understanding his hesitancy in approaching her.
“It’s hard, breaking that barrier. I was interested. I was really interested, but ...”
“What, Thomas?”
He shrugged sheepishly, and Sophie understood by his manner he didn’t want to make a big deal out of what he was saying. He lowered his head until his lips were a fraction of an inch away from her own. Their treading limbs rubbed and caressed each other’s in the slippery water.
“You’re not like the other women I’ve dated. I wasn’t sure if you’d like me,” he said quietly.
Sophie blinked. Surely he couldn’t be serious. But he’d sounded so warm . . . so genuine.
“I like you Thomas,” she whispered.
His smile at such close range hit her brain like an electrical charge.
“Good,” he murmured.
She glanced up and saw him studying her through long, spiked wet eyelashes. “So . . . do I have to get bitten by a fish or have my hand caught in a trap—” He emphasized his words by sliding his fingers suggestively down the crack of her ass. “—in order to finish what we started earlier, Sophie?”
“You might be able to talk me into it without acquiring any major injuries,” she replied breathlessly. He pressed closer and she felt her belly brush against his taut abdomen and the delicious fullness of his cock beneath his swim trunks. She hated to be so single-minded, but she’d never seen a more beautifully shaped, succulent penis in her life. The heaviness of it when he grew erect excited her beyond measure.
“I should probably shower first. I’ve been bathing in sweat and lake water,” he mumbled, his eyes fixed on her mouth as the dense column of his cock whisked lightly against her hip, teasing and thrilling her.
“We’ll shower afterwards,” Sophie said, repeating what he’d told her last night.
His eyes flashed as he met her gaze. He placed his hand at the back of her head and gave her a quick, blistering kiss that made her toes curl in the cool water. He spoke near her lips.
“You were lonely when you were young. Weren’t you, Sophie?”
Sophie’s mouth fell open in surprise. The man made a habit of turning topics on a dime. He’d just been laughing and teasing her. Where had this sudden intensity come from?
“I guess I was,” she said shakily after a moment, recognizing fully for the first time that what she said was true. Coming to the lake house without a companion had been the height of misery for her because she felt like a tag-along, a third wheel to her parents’ passionate involvement with each other. When her parents weren’t totally into the presence of each other, they were mostly focused on themselves . . . on their careers.
Thomas nodded his head slowly as his hands coasted over her hips and ass in a light caress that made her shiver.
“Lonely adults are sad,” he murmured. “But a lonely child . . . It’s worse.”
She met his stare and nodded, her throat suddenly too thick with emotion to speak. His smile was apologetic, as though he regretted his maudlin change of topic. He caught her hand and urged her toward the dock.
“Let’s go inside.” His hoarse whisper and hot eyes made her hasten. She swam rapidly as anticipation built in her. When they’d clambered up onto the dock, however, something drew her attention away from the sight of Thomas’s tanned, muscular body streaming with water, the shape and size of his erection made obvious by clinging, wet fabric.
Thomas noticed her glance toward the house. His chin swung over his shoulder. Before she could call out a flustered greeting to their visitor, however, Thomas’s expression
became cold and hard. He turned his back to her, as if blocking the sight of her from the male walking down the yard.
“Stay here,” he instructed firmly before he strode off the dock.
“Thomas?” she muttered in rising confusion when she took in his aggressive demeanor and clenched fists.
“What do you want?” Thomas shouted as he ate up the distance between himself and the approaching man on long legs.
Sophie saw the man stop in his tracks halfway down the yard as he watched Thomas rush him.
“Sophie?” the man called out.
“I asked you, what the hell do you want?”
Sophie ran up the dock when she heard the fury in Thomas’s voice.
“Stop. Thomas, stop it!” What was wrong with him? Her heart swelled in her chest, making breathing difficult, as she watched Thomas practically plow down the alarmed and increasingly angry-looking visitor. He stopped when he was toe-to-toe, just short of pushing over the tall, wiry, gray-haired man wearing his typical khaki shorts and golf shirt.
“Thomas, stop! He’s my neighbor, Sherman Dolan,” Sophie yelled as she ran up on the pair.
Sherman’s eyes rolled slightly in the sockets as if he started to glance over at Sophie but thought better of it and remained pinned to the threatening man in front of him.
“Are you all right, Sophie? I spoke to Daisy. She said she’d stopped by earlier and she was worried that something might be wrong over here. Who is this man?”
She’d never seen her jocular, easygoing neighbor look so anxious. Sherman’s nose pinched tight and he glared with a mixture of outrage and fear up at a very formidable-looking Thomas. What was it that Thomas did in the military? Sophie tried to recall dazedly. He looked absolutely deadly in that moment.
“Thomas,” she said softly. “Please.”
He blinked. She took a cautious inhale of relief when she saw the tension leave his coiled muscles and he took a step back.
“This is Thomas Nicasio, Sherman. He’s my guest. I’m sorry about—”
“You should be careful about sneaking around a person’s property like that,” Thomas told Sherman bluntly.
“Thomas, he’s my neighbor. He comes over here all the time,” Sophie snapped. She was worried about his overreaction, his hypervigilance toward what he considered to be a threat, but that didn’t give him an excuse to be rude.